Sasuke's Darkness
by SeussPepper
Summary: SPOILERS. After the war, the Leaf Village is in a time of peace, Sasuke has returned home and Sakura's dreams have come true. Everything changes when a mysterious man from their past forms a new group who's only goal is to get revenge on Sasuke by attacking who he cares about most.
1. Chapter 1

**Spoilers for the end of the manga. Read at your own risk **

* * *

"Okay now make a fist...good. Now touch your thumb to each finger...good."

Sasuke was wrapping up the examination for his new hand. He got his new arm a couple of weeks after Naruto got his repaired, so he still had to get checked up every few days to make sure it was developing properly.

He's been mostly outside of the village redeeming as many mistakes as he could from before he decided to protect the village. Sasuke got back to Konoha earlier this day, and he decided to stay here for the time being. There were still mistakes he had to fix inside the village. Speaking of which...

"Sasuke! I didn't know you were back yet," Sakura yelped happily, busting into his exam room.

She worked in the hospital most of the time so it was no wonder she heard people whispering about the final Uchiha being here.

"Hn, got back this morning."

"How long are you staying?"

"Well actually, I thought I'd stay for at least a few months."

Sakura smiled so sweetly that Sasuke knew she forgave him completely, which was something not everyone in the village did.

His nurse spoke up: "We're all done here. You should be able to get the bandages taken off in 3 days and you'll be as good as new." She exited the room.

After they were left alone, Sakura waited a few moments before throwing her arms around Sasuke's neck to hug him tightly.

"...I'm really glad you're back..."

For the first time ever, Sasuke hugged back.

**4 Months Later**

Sasuke made good on his promise to stay in the village. He only left on missions Kakashi allowed him to go on, which happened sooner than anyone thought. Although he hid it well, the sixth hokage trusted him again.

Team 7: Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura and Sai, were on a mission not too far away from the village. The war eneded with the world entering a time of peace, but there were still routine patrol missions like this to keep order.

Sakura and Sasuke were walking ahead of the other two, holding hands.

"Psst Naruto," Sai whispered, "what are you getting Sakura for her birthday?"

"I dunno. She already has what she wants most."

"Limited edition pen quills?"

"What? No. I was talking about Sasuke."

"Oh yeah sometimes I forget they're dating."

"He doesn't like public displays of affection."

"That's an understatment. Anyway, would a painting of her and Sasuke be a weird gift?"

"No that's a great idea. Why would she think that'd be weird?"

"Well obviously it'd be of them making love."

"What the hell?_!_ Yeah, that'd be a very weird gift," Naruto said just a little too loud.

"Then I'm out of ideas."

"Just draw them together _with _clothes. That might be the only way to show him smiling."

Ahead of them, Sasuke pretended like he couldn't hear them. He was enjoying the walk with his girlfriend, but this was still a mission and he was listening for threats. As far as he was concerned this time of peace was temporary.

"Hey Sasuke, I heard there's a really good market in the next village. When we're done with the mission do you wanna check it out? They have tomatoes..." Sakura implored.

"Hn, sure. We'll be done soon."

"Also, since you know my birthday's coming up soon, I was thinking after the party we could go to-"

"Wait."

"What?"

Sasuke stopped and the other three followed his lead and listened intently to the forest around them. Sakura looked up and saw her boyfriend had his sharingan activated, so she knew something serious was about to happen.

"Show yourself," Sasuke yelled, extending his hand in front of Sakura in a protective manner.

Sakura stood in a fighting stance at Sasuke's body movement.

"Even with masking our chakra you were still able to sense us. How perceptive..." a man's voice was heard from the dark treetop shadows.

After a few seconds 4 men appeared around the four Konoha shinobi. The one who spoke appeared a few yards in front of Sasuke wearing a black outfit with a red vest. The rest wore black clothing underneath a dark blue vest. They all had masks on to hide their faces. The leader had on a rabbit mask while the other three had Monkey masks.

"It's about time you guys showed yourself. I was getting tired of waiting," Naruto taunted.

"You showed no signs of noticing their presence at all," Sai whispered.

"Well yeah, I didn't want to scare you guys," Naruto said rubbing the back of his head.

Sasuke ignored Naruto's false claim and continued to glare at the man that appeared several feet before him.

"More of us will be coming. What will you do?" the man asked.

"Hn," Sasuke smirked.

"I'll wipe that smug look of your face, Uchiha."

The man ran towards Sasuke with a kunai readily in his hand. Sasuke brought a kunai of his own to block against the opponent's sharp object.

The other three followed the man's lead and pounced on the rest of the team. Naruto and Sai lunged forward to face their opponent. Sakura's opponent lurched forward to begin hand to hand combat but she quickly did a backflip to avoid his attack he soon caught up with her. She and her opponent moved quickly responding to each others attack exchanging and catching blows. The attacker raised his left leg to kick Sakura in the gut but Sakura quickly caught his foot and with her super strength slammed her opponent's body onto the floor. The man laid on the floor with a smile on his face, he began to laugh.

"Back up," she mumbled and sensed four more chakras a few feet away from them.

They appeared in her sight jumping out of the trees and towards her she quickly jumped up to avoid all four of their attacks and sent green chakra to her fist. Her fist then made contact with the ground and the ground beneath her feet began to crack and break apart underneath her. Sakura then jumped up to avoid the shockwave. The others on Team Seven knew how to avoid the impact of her attack and jumped up as well.

Sasuke stole a quick glance at Sakura and saw that she was doing fine but saw that there were more enemies now and they were all going for Sakura. Sakura had a fighting stance. She didn't plan to fight against this many enemies but she thought of a way to take them all on. She readied chakra in fist once more. Before she could even move Sasuke appeared in front of her, a purple aura began to appear around him. Sasuke had thought of keeping the Susanoo out of this fight since he thought his enemies were nothing but a bunch of weak ninja. He did still think that, but now there were more and he thought of the best possible way to get rid of them quick. He also needed to bring it out to jump in front of Sakura to protect her.

A giant purple arm extended and knocked all of the approaching enemies with much force. They flew a couple of yards away.

The leader that was Sasuke's opponent saw how the raven haired Uchiha ran to protect the pink kunoichi:

_Hmmm… I should tell him about this. This information is enough for now. _

The man with the rabbit mask appeared next to his fallen men. Sai and Naruto appeared next to Sasuke and Sakura; they had defeated their opponent.

"We'll see each other soon Uchiha," the leader with the rabbit mask said.

Leaf circled around the group of rogue ninjas and they all disappeared. Sasuke tried to sense if they were nearby but they must've used a transportation jutsu.

Sasuke's purple aura diminished and he turned around to face Sakura.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I'm fine," she walked past him and stood facing forward. "Let's get going," she said in a serious tone.

* * *

Sakura didn't talk much to Sasuke the rest of the mission or on the way back. They all walked through the village gates; the sun had just set a few moments ago and now the sky was swallowed up in darkness. Naruto knocked on the Hokage's door.

"Come in," the silver haired man called out from the other side of the door.

Naruto and the rest of them walked in and paled at what they saw. They saw their Sensei/Hokage leaning back in his chair reading his IchaIcha book.

"What's wrong?" Kakashi asked.

"Aeh," Naruto's face twitched. "What do you mean what's wrong? You're the Hokage now. You can't be reading that smut in public anymore you pervert."

"I finished my paperwork." Kakashi said gesturing to his clear desk.

"THAT'S NOT THE POINT!" Naruto and Sakura said simultaneously.

Kakashi sighed and put his book away and looked up at the four.

Sasuke, knowing that he was waiting for their information, began to speak. Sasuke spoke few words but with those few words he had told Kakashi what he needed to hear.

"_Rabbit mask..._" Kakashi repeated Sasuke's words after he had spoken them.

"Okay. You guys can go and rest up now," Kakashi said to his subordinates.

All of them made for the door and walked out of the Hokage's room. Sasuke was the last to leave and saw an ANBU holding the door open with his partner next to him. They walked in to talk to Kakashi after Team 7 exited.

The two ANBU kneeled, and then stood up straight.

"Hokage-sama, we bring back news of a potential threat to the village."

"What is it?"

"These group of masked ninjas had attacked us while we patrolled the west of the village. The leader had a mask of a rabbit." The first ANBU spoke.

"He has the ability to take away your sight. I was separated from my partner and found him in trouble as the one with the rabbit mask was in the middle of performing some procedure. He quickly fled after seeing me and I went to assist him," the second ANBU said.

"He had temporarily taken away my eyesight," the first remarked.

Kakashi's eyes went wide.

"After a few hours I had gained it back. It seemed that he wasn't done with the procedure, so it didn't take away my eyesight permanently."

"What do we do Hokage-sama?" the second ANBU asked.

Kakashi was quiet for a few seconds.

"Leave me to my thoughts to think of the best course of action."

"Yes." Both anbu kneeled once again and left the room.

Kakashi turned in his chair and looked out onto the village streets down below.

_What is his motive? Who are they after? _

* * *

Sasuke and Sakura walked in silence. He had been used to it since it had been happening the past couple of days. He knew that Sakura wasn't happy with him for some reason. He wanted to bring it up but they were never alone on the mission and Sasuke wasn't the one to bring up relationship problems in front of anyone. Sakura opened the door to her apartment and stepped inside.

She had been holding in all her anger. Her trigger for all this stored anger? Sasuke thought she was too weak to defend herself in front of the enemy.

_How can he think that I'm still weak? After all I have done. All the hard training I had with Tsunade, all the jutsu I learned since I was younger means nothing to him because he still sees that weak girl. I'll never be strong enough to fend for myself. _

"Sakura," Sasuke said in a soft voice and he held onto her wrist as she walked towards her living room.

"What?" she said in rasp tone. Her tone towards her boyfriend even caught her off guard.

"Tell me what's wrong."

"Why does it matter, it won't change anything."

"Sakura please-"

"Please what, Sasuke?" she said in a harsh tone and turned around to make eye contact with him.

She saw how soft and warm his eyes looked.

"Please tell me what's wrong."

Sakura's fierce eyes now softened. She hated that he had this kind of impact on her.

"Why did you protect me?"

"When?"

"When we were battling the rogue ninja." Sakura's anger began to seep back into her voice.

"Because for were planning to attack you at once."

"And you thought that I couldn't take all of them on myself?"

"..."

"I knew it. You still think I'm that weak little girl from before."

"It's not that."

"Really? Because it sure seems like it Sasuke. I had a plan that would've taken down all four of them but you never gave me the chance to fight. You went back to thinking that I was the same weak girl that had to rely on you or Naruto to save me.

"It irritates me. It irritates me that you can't trust in my own abilities to save myself from danger. It's like all the training and hard work I put into making myself as strong doesn't even matter. I was there to help with Kaguya, I eliminated an Akatsuki member with the help of Chiyo. I had been able to save myself from danger several times before when you weren't there for me."

Sasuke felt his stomach churn listening to the last part.

Sasuke opened up his mouth to speak but no words came out.

"I just want to see that look on your face again," she commented.

Sasuke looked slightly confused. Sakura continued knowing that her statement was too broad.

"That look. The look of respect for me and how strong I was during the war. Even if you were hard to read I saw that look and it made all that I accomplished worth it. You finally acknowledged how strong I had become."

"Sakura. I'm sorry."

Sakura was taken back. She hadn't heard him apologize since the day she found him and Naruto clinging to life after their fight.

"I wanted to protect you because I don't want to lose you," he said out of the corner of his mouth, "When I was younger, I didn't have the strength to protect the ones I loved and lost them. I don't want…"

Their eyes locked and he finished his little speech with a soft, comforting voice: "I don't want to lose you too."

Sakura was happy hearing how he cared for her so much but she still had to think of herself on this.

"Sasuke," she moved closer to him, "I love you too, but I need you trust me."

Sasuke hesitantly nodded.

"Thank you." She smiled softly and placed her hands around his shoulders. She tippy toed and placed a kiss on his lips.

Sasuke placed his hands on her hips.

"You need to take a shower," Sasuke said with a smirk on his face.

"Oh is that sooooo?" She said teasingly.

"Yeah, you reek." He held his smirk.

"You should help me clean up."

"Hn." Sasuke's hands moved under her bottom and she jumped, wrapped her legs around him and he carried her off to the bathroom.

* * *

**To be Continued very soon. **


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for the great feedback on chapter 1. This chapters funnier, but this will get darker in a few chapters. **

* * *

Sasuke and Sakura woke up the next morning, laying in her bed with their legs intertwined as she used his chest as a pillow.

Sakura yawned into him and lazily said, "Good morning."

He was still tired after a long night of...activities, so he still had his eyes closed as he replied, "Hn. Good morning."

"Do you have anything to do today or do I have you all to myself?"

"I wish...," he said before glancing at the clock, "I have to meet with Shikamaru and Shino in an hour. I should probably go get ready."

"Aww do you have to go now?"

"I have to," he mumbled, then kissed the top of her head.

"Maybe tonight you can leave some of your stuff here...tch, you sleep over plenty. It'll save time in the future."

"Are you trying to trick me into moving in?"

"Nooooo but it could be nice, and I can bring some of my stuff to your place."

"Sure, that'd be nice."

Sakura loved how sweet he was in the mornings. Sasuke sat up and swung his legs over the bed and began getting dressed; he already left some clothing at her place.

Sakura asked, "Hey, if or when we move in together, would you move here or would I move in with you? I don't want to pressure you into—"

"My place obviously."

"You answered that awfully fast. And what do you mean 'obviously'?"

"My place is bigger."

"My bed is softer."

"We'll bring your mattress then."

"Yeah but I also have more stuff to move."

Sasuke grinned to himself and asked, "This is still theoretical, right?"

"Yeah of course. I'd never move in with someone if I wasn't, like, engaged..."

Sasuke gulped. Maybe commitment was one of his fears even though he loved Sakura to death.

"Mhm I gotta go," he yelped quickly in a slightly higher-pitched voice.

* * *

Sasuke went back to Kakshi's office. The night before he received a secret message summoning him here. He was, of course, the first one there. In a few minutes Shikamaru entered the room.

"Did Kakashi ask you to come too?"

" is there so much secrecy?"

"I don't know. Whatever the threat is, we don't want people to panic."

"Hn."

Next, after Shikamaru took a seat next to Sasuke, came Shino. They could both hear his insects buzzing from across the room.

"Is this it?" Shino asked.

"No we're waiting for one more."

"_Two _more!" called a new voice down the hall. Kiba burst in with Akamaru close behind.

Shikamaru began the mission briefing: "As we should all know, there's a new faction of enemies gathering. Who their leader is, what their motives are and how big of threat they poise is all unknown. What we do know is they held their own against Team 7 yesterday so we're taking them seriously. Our mission is to gather intelligence on them and hopefully track their movements."

"Eh Sasuke, are these guys really a threat?" Kiba asked.

"...I couldn't sense them until they were very close, they were tough and fast, at lease the leader was, and they knew a teleportation justsu I've never seen before."

"Right, they were last seen a few miles west of the village. Sasuke, bring whatever clothing you were wearing yesterday. Since you fought so close to them their scent might still be on them. Akamaru should be able to get us close," Shikamaru order, which everybody nodded in agreement to, "Everyone meet up at the gates in 10 minutes, and remember, don't tell anybody what we're doing."

* * *

When Sasuke got back to Sakura's apartment he knocked, but there was no answer. He used the spare key under the welcome mat to get inside. In there, Sakura was nowhere to be seen. He walked to the bedroom and grabbed his dirty t-shirt from yesterday and was almost out of the door when he saw a magazine on the kitchen floor.

Sasuke's curiosity got the better of him, so he picked up the magazine. The cover read: Konoha People. Sasuke hated gossip magazines like this, but Sakura always read them. He opened it up and flipped through it until he saw a picture of a necklace that Sakura circled with a bright marker. The necklace was the same color as her eyes and equally beautiful.

_Her birthday's coming up...maybe this is what she wants?_

* * *

Sakura went to Ino and Sai's house shortly after Sasuke left. The two of them were dating longer than her and Sasuke were and they already lived together. Sakura thought they were really cute together, and she loved how convenient it was to visit her friends at the same time.

Sakura and Ino were sitting on the couch while Sai was in the kitchen sketching ideas for Sakura's birthday present.

"I'm gonna throw you such a nice party, Sakura!" Ino boasted.

"Thanks, but you don't have to go all out. Whatever you do will be fine, really."

"Are you kidding? I've been planning this for a month."

Sai interjected from across the room: "She hired someone."

"Shut up Sai," Ino yelled.

"You hired a party planner?"

Ino squealed, "Yes! I wanted it to be a surprise, but I hired Partido Planif, he graduated top of his class."

"He was home schooled," Sai called out.

"Shut up Sai!"

* * *

Sasuke caught up to Shikamaru, Shino, Kiba and Akamaru. They ran out of the village as fast as they could. It took them half an hour to reach the fight location from the other day despite all of them running as fast as they could.

"Here. It was right here," Sasuke declared.

"Alright Akamaru, let's show 'em what we can do. Sasuke, take off your shirt," Kiba said.

Sasuke took the dirty shirt out of his bag and threw it to Kiba.

"Oh, you brought another shirt...I knew that. OKAY Akamaru lets smell this_!_" Kiba then took a whiff himself of Sasuke's shirt since he too had a keen sense of smell. It was what he and Akamaru always did. It was a way to assure themselves in case on nose or snout failed to perform.

After taking in the scent from the shirt he brought it down for his canine complain to smell. The large dog buried his nose in the shirt and looked around the forest sniffing. After a moment he bolted into the woods and everyone followed him. Akamaru had to get the scent a couple more times but they eventually found their way to a field.

"Gheeze it's a dead end," Shino mumbled.

"Are you sure?" Shikamaru asked.

Akamaru whimpered a little upset that he couldn't find the scent past the location at which they started. Kiba's face tensed.

"I told you, that we can't find this bastard and his teammates. The trail goes cold where he disappeared. The teleportation jutsu was a good way to go to throw us off. Maybe he knew."

"Are you saying he may have intelligence on the leaf's shinobi and their abilities?" Shikamaru said.

Shikamaru slightly clenched his teeth.

_Damnit, if it's like that then this guy is more of a threat than Kakashi said he would be. Not only are his full abilities not shown yet but maybe all of ours have. _

"Wait..." Shino said snapping Shikamaru out of his thoughts, "My insects, they're...hungry?"

A cloud of flies escaped from under his sleeves and went behind a boulder. Sasuke was the first to catch up to them. Behind the rocks was a cliff that had half-eaten plates of food, crumbled pieces of paper and a pair of binoculars.

"What is this place...?" Shino asked.

"This is an unusual place to camp," Shikamaru said to himself.

Sasuke grabbed the binoculars and scanned the area the cliff was facing.

"What do you see?" Kiba asked.

"...the village."

* * *

"They're watching us!" Kiba yelled, slamming his hand down on Kakashi's desk.

"Calm down, we still don't know what we're dealing with," Kakashi replied calmly.

"We know it's nothing good," Sasuke added.

"We also know that they may have the upper hand here. They've been watching us to get to know our moves and how to counteract that. When making a decision of who to send out after this guy we have to consider how to throw him off his game. Throw him a wild card to throw his plan off the rails," Shikamaru said.

"Hm," Kakashi said while facing the away from the four men in his office. He looked through the windows looking at the children playing in the streets. A few seconds later he turned around to face the four. "Thank you for the information. I only wish you could have found more but it must've been a stretch already to find what you did since the enemy is very cautious. The enemy had a slip up and you caught it, It may be that we may have this information to throw him off guard like Shikamaru said..."

The four looked at their Hokage and nodded their heads slowly.

"You're dismissed for now," the gray-haired hokage turned back around to have the view of the village once again.

The group left the office and began walking in different directions.

Sasuke took one step out of the building when two hands covered his eyes from behind: "Guess who?"

"Hello Sakura," he greeted monotonously even though he loved her playful games.

"How was your mission?" she asked as they began walking away, side by side as the sun began to set.

"Fine, a little boring I guess."

"Good. Boring means safe."

He scoffed, "Yeah yeah...did you wanna do something?"

"I'm feeling really tired, can we just go back to my place?"

"So am I..." he noted as they continued walking, "What do you want for your birthday?"

"Anything."

"Tch."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I was going to ask the same thing."

"I mean it: anything you get me will be fine."

"Give me a hint."

"Um...something pretty?"

"Like jewelry."

"Your words, not mine," Sakura teased. Sakura's smile then contorted. Sasuke noticed.

"What's wrong?"

"I need to pass by the market to get some things," she said sighing kiddishly.

"Let's go get them then," Sasuke replied.

"But you said you just wanted to go to your place since you were tired," she said.

"I don't mind. We can just go to your place instead. I mean you do have a _softer mattress_," he mocked, slightly smirking at her referring to their conversation earlier today.

Sakura smiled. "Okay then."

Sasuke and Sakura walked through the village streets and stopped at their destination.

Sasuke observed and walked closely behind Sakura as she grabbed items and placed them into the red hand basket.

"Where were you this morning? I went to your house soon after leaving and you weren't there," Sasuke questioned, trying to start a conversation and also asking out of curiosity.

"I was visiting Sai and Ino. Ino said she hired a party planner for my birthday."

"Oh really?" Sasuke said kind of upset that Ino had already upstaged him.

"Yeah," she remarked, walking through the isles where food was stacked on shelves, "I was thinking of making something for dinner instead of going out and getting something. Do you have anything in mind?"

_He's going to say something with tomatoes. _Sakura thought to herself.

"I liked that soup that you made the last time."

"The chicken soup?" She was playing dumb with him. She knew which one he meant and so did he and that is why he playfully squinted his eyes at her.

"What?"

"You know," he teased, still playfully glaring.

"Okay, I do. Tomato soup it is," She giggled and smiled at him.

Sasuke's squint had disappeared and his face appeared calm at the sight of seeing her bright green eyes gleam along with the smile that was placed on her lips. He always thought that her viridian eyes were beautiful. To him, Sakura's eyes reminded him of late spring when the vegetation began to sprout out and bloom showing it's vibrant green color. In a way she was the spring to his winter in the way the way she warmed and melted away his icy walls that he had to keep ones away from his caring nature. Those emerald eyes are the eyes that he stared into when he told Sakura that he loved her. Those eyes are the eyes that that would close hesitantly when Sakura would lie on top of his stomach belly down staring at him while he would talk to her. Those eyes that he looked into when he made to love to her.

Sasuke smile grew.

"What are you smiling at?" Sakura asked slightly blushing.

"Nothing," he lied looking away.

They walked to the produce isle before they ended up where the tomatoes were Sasuke leaned into over and put his mouth close to her ear.

"I love you."

She turned around surprised at hearing him say that in public. Sure he whispered it, but he never said it when other people were nearby. He always said it when they were in the comfort of their own homes. She blushed furiously and looked away.

Sasuke smiled after slightly chuckling at her reaction.

She got her composure back together and began to put the tomatoes into the red basket.

"I love you too, Sasuke Uchiha," she replied in a low tone that only he could hear.

Sasuke got a slight blush but it soon disappeared.

"You still need to take me to that village store that sells good tomatoes. We never got to do that."

They never got to because she was keeping her distance from him when they were doing their mission after their encounter with the rabbit-masked man. Sakura felt a little upset knowing that she never got to take him.

"I'm sorry. Next time we'll go there for sure. I know you love tomatoes but these are incredible and frankly I think once you'll taste them you'll want to marry them."

"That's stupid."

"But knowing your love tomatoes, it's highly possible."

"Hn."

Sakura began to laugh.

They had arrived at Sakura's apartment and ate tomato soup, which Sasuke ate more than half of the pot. After eating they cleaned up and rested in front of the t.v. It soon got dark outside.

"Sakura," Sasuke said, placing his hand on her thigh and slightly shaking it since she fell asleep.

He was trying to wake her up so they could both go to bed but she was already in deep sleep since he heard her little snores as he got closer to her. He took in the view of her worry-free facial expression. He smiled and stood up and held her in his arms bridal style and walked to her bedroom. He placed her down and then slowly and carefully put the bed cover on her, not wanting to wake her up from her sleep. He then took off his black V-neck shirt and lied next to her. He lied there staring at her a smirk placed upon his lips. His facial expression then went serious thinking of the threat.

_I don't know what is going to happen with him but, I promise to protect you. No one will harm you. Sakura. Not while I'm around. _

* * *

**Hey Saiduck here I'm a co-writer to this story. I couldn't type that much in this chapter but my thoughts sure went into it. I'll make it my priority to type a boatload in the next chapter. I will also be updating one of my SasuSaku's too. I apologize, I've been busy with Anatomy homework and it's killing me. Tell us what you think about our writing! It'll make our day. **

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	3. Chapter 3

**Here ya go! Let us know how you like this.  
**

* * *

The room was dark. It was deep underground and the only source of lighting was that of torches that lit the caverns' passageways. A man in a monkey mask came running towards the hallway and made a hasty stop in front of a gray door.

"Come in," a man's voice was heard.

The man with the monkey mask stepped in and got on one knee behind the back of a bulky concrete chair.

"What is it?" the voice asked.

The henchman walked in front of the chair and looked at the two figures in front of him. One sitting in a chair the other standing at his side. The one standing was the man with a white rabbit mask. His spiky grey hair could be seen at the top of the mask. The man must've had his eyes closed since they couldn't be seen. As soon as the henchman keeled in front of them, both of Rabbit Mask's eyes opened which caught the eye of the henchman. Those vibrant green eyes could catch anyone's attention in a dark room or any room for that matter, but his eyes didn't smile. His eyes were a paradox. They were bright in color but if you kept on looking you could see the darkness that loomed in them. The sitting man was laid back in the chair and the light source only illuminated him below the neck. He was wearing a maroon cloak that left no piece of skin showing.

"Sir, our observation outpost has been discovered," said a timid voice came from the henchman in the monkey mask.

"Then we're right on schedule. It was a part of the plan to be discovered," the leader in the chair said.

He continued: "They will also be sending out Team 7 and 8 to investigate us. Make sure they find you. It is going to be the time to drop the main phase of our plan."

"I understand..."

He then quickly left.

The man with the rabbit mask moved his mask to the side, revealing a part of his chiseled jaw line and cream colored skin.

"How were you able to find that out?" he asked.

"I sent out a small friend to get the information that we needed."

"Who?"

"A summoning. He was undetectable and soon after disappeared without a trace."

"So what is going to happen in the next phase of the plan?" the green-eyed man asked.

"We're going to get a little revenge on the Uchiha," the man began to chuckle, at first in a low tone but soon it grew louder. "Revenge on Sasuke Uchiha!"

He continued laughing and he moved his face into the light revealing his serpent eyes and his white, scaly colored skin. He brought up his hand and pushed his glasses up as they had shifted done the spine of his nose in his moment of laughter.

The green-eyed man only stared at his master. He then brought up his arm to cover his face with his mask and pulled the cloak hood over his hair.

* * *

Team 7 and Team 8 were traveling among the trees at high speed. It was late noon. They were sent out to find any clues of this new group of villains, capture their leader and find out what their motives were.

The first couple hours they were running blind finding no scent, no sign of them but luck then appeared on their side a few hours later when Sasuke found tree markings. Sasuke observed them and noted that they were fresh. As soon as he made that observation Akamaru and Kiba's noses twitched and Kiba notified that he smelled the scent that he smelled off of Sasuke's shirt the previous day.

Kiba and Akamaru got a few steps ahead of the others and led them as the scent became more and more apparent. Kiba abruptly stopped and so did the rest.

"What's wrong?" Sasuke asked.

"Hinata," Kiba said, ignoring the Uchiha's question. Hinata knowing why he said her name from several years of teamwork activated her Byakugan.

"They're waiting. There is 12 of them. 36 meters away from here. One seems to have a strange chakra," she explained with a serious face.

"Those bastards. They expected us," Kiba growled. "What do we do?"

He looked at Sasuke who was the one in charge of everyone on this mission.

"They expected a platoon, let's hope they underestimate us," Sasuke looked in the direction of where they were located then looked back at the team. "You three are what they haven't gone up against. They don't know your skills. We still have the upper hand in battle. If we can't capture the leader of the group and things start to look bleak, Naruto and I will settle for drastic measures."

Sasuke looked at Naruto, who nodded and made his way over to Hinata.

"Hinata," Sasuke called out to her.

"Yes?"

"You have to show me the one that has the abnormal chakra," he explained, looking at her with a serious face.

"Understood," Hinata said quickly giving a nod with her response.

Sasuke looked straight forward, "Let's do this."

They began to go full speed in the direction where the enemy was, Sasuke and Sakura being a few feet ahead of the others.

"Sakura," Sasuke called out while jumping from tree limb to tree limb.

She was looking forward but for a second looked at him. "Yes, Sasuke?"

"Be careful," he implored quietly, continuously looking ahead, not breaking his eye contact with the forest in front of him.

She had a micro blush on her cheeks, "Yes."

They all halted and jumped into the open space of the forest floor. A few feet away from them were the henchmen that all had maroon cloaks with their hoods up. Sasuke saw how this time there were two men with the rabbit mask. There was a way to tell them apart since one was a light blue color and the other was white. Sasuke was pondering on why there were two with the rabbit mask.

"So you found us," the one in the white mask commented. "Are you ready to be taken down?"

Naruto was already annoyed with this guy and his stereotypical bad-guy talk and was snarling at him.

"Shut up already!" Naruto shouted.

The man in the white mask laughed.

"This guy is so annoying," Kiba remarked in a tone only his group could hear.

Sakura, Sai and Shino just stood there behind Sasuke, Hinata and the loud-mouthed two.

"Hinata," Sasuke said to the timid girl to the right of him.

"Byakugan!" The veins were made apparent on her facial tissue. She looked at Sasuke and told him, "The one in the white mask is the one with the strange chakra."

"Hn."

"My my look at those eyes. It would be a real shame if something happened to him," the man in the white mask said threateningly, looking at the Hyuuga heiress.

What does he mean by that? Sasuke pondered.

"You won't even get to touch Hinata you bastard!" Naruto yelled, his face showing an intimidating scowl.

"Heh," was all the enemies smirked when Naruto made his way at a high speed towards the leader. One henchman threw a smoke bomb on the floor.

Sasuke mentally cursed at his friend's short fuse.

Naruto jumped back and the others ran to his side.

"Think before you make a move, Naruto" Sasuke ordered coldly.

The smoke cleared and they saw their enemy running at full speed towards them. They all jumped back and scattered.

Sakura and Sai ran back to a treetop and the other three went in the direction of the two monkey masks and the one with the blue rabbit mask. Sasuke, who scattered to the left had the one with the white mask after him. The rest that scattered to the right with 8 opponents waiting for them.

Sai looked at Sakura. "They're dividing to conquer."

"The enemy has no idea what we're capable of!" Sakura said confidently.

"Sakura!" Sai pushed her away from a kunai that headed her way while she was talking to him.

* * *

Sasuke had heard Sai yell Sakura's name. He was battling his white-masked opponent when he heard him. He was momentarily distracted and almost received a kick to the head, but he dodged at the last possible moment.

_She might be in trouble! I need to go find her. _

He suddenly saw why that would be bad. _No, I have to trust her. She wants my trust, and she's stronger than before._

Sasuke's body moved in the direction where he heard Sai's shout. He didn't realized that he was moving in that direction until his opponent jumped in front of him and made clones to keep Sasuke from advancing any further. It was his body reacting on it's own. His body knew his duty was to protect what was most important to him. Sasuke clenched his teeth.

"Damnit!" he hissed as he caught a glimpse Sakura's pink hair before it disappeared as a fireball caused her to jump out of his sight several meters away from him.

* * *

"Gentle step twin lion fist!" Hinata yelled as chakra formed into the shape of the ferocious beast and rammed into one of her opponents. He fell to the floor unconscious. The other one snuck behind her and kicked her to a tree trunk.

"Hinata!" Naruto yelled with a worried look on his face. He ran to her, avoiding the attacks of his two opponents.

"I'm fine Naruto," she assured and stood up as if she was never kicked with deadly force.

One of the the henchman threw a kunai towards the back of Naruto's head. Kiba threw his own kunai to counteract the enemies just in the knick of time.

"Hey open your eyes! I just saved your ass from going to the next world," Kiba shouted abruptly, stopping next to the pair on top of his giant dog.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've saved your ass many times too."

"That's not the point you idiot," Kiba responded, lurching at the incoming enemy and kicked him back.

"Concentrate on the enemy," Shino ordered, appearing from behind the tree trunk where Hinata and the other two just stood by. More opponents appeared behind them, making Naruto and Hinata move to the center of the open area.

"At least we have one down, thanks to Hinata," Kiba complimented while dodging a punch from one henchman and then quickly balled up his hand into a fist and punched him back in the face knocking him off his feet.

"Yeah," Naruto added.

The enemy circled the four ninja's and ninja hound.

"Crap. They closed in on us," Kiba said.

"We just have to break through then," Naruto made his hand sign to bring up his shadow clones then froze as he looked up to see one of the henchmen jump above him and throw off his cloak.

Everyone looked up to see the henchman who grabbed red-colored vials from a belt on his waist.

"What is that?!" Kiba asked.

The man up in the air holding the red vials threw them onto the ground and all of the enemies that surrounded them backed away. The vial released a red colored gas that surround the Konoha nin and seeped into their lungs and respiratory tract.

The four ninjas and one ninja dog coughed trying to get rid of the red gas.

It soon cleared with a breeze that passed by.

"What the hell was that?" Kiba asked again with coughs coming out of his mouth after every word.

He then heard Akamaru whimper.

"What's wrong boy?" Kiba said through the coughing fit.

Akamaru whimpered once more.

"What?" Kiba raised his nose in the air and inhaled deeply through his nostril. "Fuck."

"What?" Naruto asked.

"Akamaru and I can't smell anything. Our sense of smell has been dulled."

The sound chattering of insects was heard by the others and they looked at Shino.

"The gas has made my bugs unresponsive," Shino added.

Now seeing that the air from the gas was blown away, their opponents jumped in front of the five nin.

"So that means it's just us against them," Shino commented, looking at Naruto who nodded with a serious expression on his face.

Naruto then made made a hand sign.

"Let's finish this," Naruto declared. "Shadow clone jutsu!"

* * *

The enemies stood on a branch 10 feet across from Sai and Sakura. Sasuke was still fighting the leader not too far away.

"Sai, are you okay?" Sakura looked at Sai's shoulder that was badly grazed by the kunai.

Green chakra went to her hands, and she placed them on his wounded shoulder to heal the wound.

"It's fine. Save your chakra for the enemy. They're stronger than they look." He shrugged off her hand, and she nodded in agreement.

They're going to further divide us. We have to try our best to fight them off together," Sakura said, facing their three opponents.

Sakura saw Sai nod from the corner of her eye. The enemy with the blue rabbit mask lurched for them. Sakura and Sai saw the two henchman on the branch make the hand sign for fire style.

"Sai, get out of the way!" Sakura yelled and jumped to the right. Her headband slipped off of her head without anyone noticing.

Sai immediately leaped to the left to avoid the heat of the attack from both opponents. The two henchmen went in the direction that Sai fled to and the third member went in the direction Sakura went.

"Damnit!" she cursed, "We're separated."

She observed from the back of a tree trunk to see where the enemy went to next. She could smell the scent of leaves and wood burning from the enemy's attack. She had masked her chakra to avoid being sneaked up upon.

Sakura's eyes widened as a shuriken anchored itself in the trunk of the tree she was observing from. The shuriken was just centimeters away from her head. She quickly turned around and saw the blue-masked opponent. He appeared in front of Sakura in just a second and backhanded her with the force to throw her down a few feet back. She stood up and ran to him and sent her fist at him. He pushed it aside and attempted a sweep kick to knock her off her feet. She jumped and threw her leg into the air to land he knee on his jaw. He threw her back while she was still in the air. She quickly landed with a stance and didn't fall from being thrown.

She looked at her opponent and grinned. Sakura sent green chakra to her fists and she ran to him, making him think that she was going for a direct attack. He moved out of the way, which was what she wanted. Sakura quickly made her fist punch the ground making a crater around her. Her opponent was thrown off by her move and was suspended in the air. Sakura jumped up and sent chakra to her fist once more and punched him in the gut, she saw the ripple of the force move throughout her midsection before he was sent flying into the tall truck of the tree several meters away from her.

She pulled out a kunai from the pouch on her thigh. As she calmly walked over to her opponent she heard him cough as he was slouched against the tree. Blood was then seen run from under the blue mask; it ran down his cream colored skin.

She stood in front of him, kunai ready in her hand ready to attack.

"Who are you and what do you want?" she demanded. Her eyebrows arched and a serious look etched on her face.

"Heh,"he mocked her question.

Before she could get close enough to unmask him, she felt something or someone touch the back of her head softly. Her vision began to get hazy and she felt very tired. Her eyes closed and she let go of the kunai before her body collapsed on to the enemy. The opponent in the blue mask looked up to see a duplicate of himself standing behind Sakura. The clone poofed from existence.

The masked enemy shoved her body off and stood up holding his midsection where he had received her punch. His chakra glowed green and he began to heal the ruptured blood vessels and broken nerve tissue. She was stronger than he expected.

A cloud of smoke ascended from him. His appearance changed: the brown eyes that he had were now a green color and his brown hair color turned silver. He leaned down and threw the unconscious kunoichi over his shoulder and took off into a deeper part of the forest.

* * *

Sasuke stood in front of his green-eyed, silver haired opponent that was huffing but continued to dodge his attacks. Sasuke observed that his opponent's fighting skills were different from last time. At first that wasn't the case but as their battle progressed his fighting style began to change entirely.

_What's going on? _

Sasuke backed away and threw a kunai which the rabbit-masked man quickly deflected with the kunai in his right hand. Sasuke's opponent looked like he was about to collapse from exhaustion.

_This is my chance. _

Sasuke launched himself at him to knock him out since they needed a person to bring back to the village and interrogate. Sasuke readied his fist and uppercut him, his mask fell off, exposing the fair-colored skin of his opponent. The mysterious opponent fell with a thud.

A smoke cloud appeared around his opponent. Sasuke's eyes widened in shock. The enemy's hair turned brown and his eyes went from a vibrant green to a dark brown.

Transformation jutsu! Which means the other one….He remember the one with the blue rabbit mask went after Sakura and Sai.

_Sakura...! _

Sasuke clenched his teeth. His eyebrows were arched in anger. He grabbed the henchman that fooled him by his arms and flung him over his shoulder. The henchman groaned in pain but Sasuke paid no attention to him. He was angry and also felt worried. Worried for Sakura.

* * *

"There," Kiba said throwing the last henchman into the unconscious-henchman pile they had in front of them. "That makes all of them."

"All we need is for Sasuke and Sakura to find us," Sai commented.

None of them noticed Sasuke and his prisoner had walked up behind.

"Sakura isn't here!?" Sasuke hissed angrily.

Naruto, Sai, Kiba, Shino, Hinata and even Akamaru looked at him with big, round eyes.

"She's not with you...?" Hinata asked.

"Where is she!" Sasuke yelled, angry that he couldn't protect her and scared at all the possibilities.

"I don't know, and all of our tracking abilities were dulled!" Kiba admitted.

* * *

Sakura opened her eyes. It was dark, and it was obvious a few hours had passed. Her last conscious memories came back to her and she tried to move, but couldn't since her hands and legs were bound with a coarse rope. She laid belly down with her head turned to the side. She tried to pull herself free from one of her bound hands hoping that her captor made a mistake and didn't bound her properly. Tugging roughly at her right and left arms she got nowhere but felt the rope's material already cut into her wrists. Her captor knew how to have someone tied up.

She was more worried about her teammates than herself. Did they get captured too? Did they defeat their opponents? Do they know she's missing?

_No, Sasuke and Naruto are not the ones to get themselves into situations like this. She then felt guilty. I told him to trust me and I got myself into this! Why…Why am I always the useless one!_

Tears began to form along the bottom of her eye. She closed her eyes and the tears flowed down her cheek and onto the dirt floor.

"Stop crying..."she heard an unfamiliar voice command and then she saw a glowing orange light a few feet away.

The light came closer and the man walked over with a candle in his hand and tilted it to light up a torch that was on the side of the wall. The torch gave the once dark room an orange glow. Sakura saw the figure with his back faced to her. He stood there silent for a few seconds. The suspense to know who captured her was killing her. He turned and the first thing she saw were bright green eyes through the eye sockets of a white mask.

The white-masked man was Sasuke's opponent. Why is he here? Panic was sent through her body as she thought of the possibilities of what could've happened to Sasuke.

"You…" she said shakily. Her courage surged up to the surface and pushed aside her fears.

"Where's Sasuke?!" she yelled with a fierce tone.

He looked at her with an amused face, but said nothing.

Her eyebrows arched and her green eyes took a darker, angrier shade.

"Might as well tell you..." the man whispered.

She looked at him, her eyes not losing their intensity for even a second.

"The Uchiha is fine. I fooled him to fight someone else instead of me."

"Why? What do you want?!" she said with diminishing strength in her voice.

He walked over to Sakura and squatted down. She still had her eyes on him while lying on the floor. He picked Sakura up by her hair. She gritted her teeth, keeping in her wails of pain as he lifted her body up by the strands of her hair and then threw her back to lean against the wall behind her. Sakura could still feel the strands under strain and the pain on the back of her head was still stinging. She closed her eyes and breathed in deep, then opened her eyes and saw him standing straight in front of her.

"…who are you…?" she asked.

Silence.

He lifted his hand up and the material of the maroon-colored cloak slid down his forearm and exposed his flesh. Sakura saw a tattoo of two dragons with their long necks crossing each other, and then as their necks continued upwards, their heads spaced out from one another as if they were repulsing one another. One of the dragons was blue and the other was red.

Sakura's eyes began to look up and then saw his hand touch his white rabbit mask. He grabbed it and began to lift up the mask. As the strap of the mask slid off it caused his hood to fall off of his head, exposing his silver-colored hair. He stood there in front of Sakura with his eyes closed.

"I'm Yato," he said, now opening his eyes. He walked towards Sakura.

Sakura had her eyes fixated on his now that the mask was out of the way. His eyes were the exact same color as hers: green, but his seemed darker somehow. Green is the color of life, but as she looked at his eyes she didn't get that. His eyes were cold and dead with no vibrancy. His eyes reminded her of Sasuke's eyes before his redemption in the war.

She snapped out of her thoughts when he grabbed the back of her head and made her kneel in front of him. She squirmed and fell back to her original position. He got irritated and placed a hand of her shoulder. A weird orange colored chakra surfaced from his hand and she felt weaker. He pulled her to kneel in front of him once again. She now fell forward from lack of energy but he held her up by putting his palm on her forehead. Sakura's eyes looked up at him.

He looked at her glowing, green eyes. His face contorted to a look of anger. He hated that her eyes had that gleam to them that her eyes gave off a warm feeling when his were cold. It made his skin crawl. If he had the choice he would gouge out her eyes since they repulsed him, but he couldn't since Kabuto said this had to be done.

"What are you going to do to me?" she asked weakly, her eyes showing a tinge of fear.

The look in her eyes made him clench his teeth in anger. He thought that he hated the way they looked before but now he saw that he was wrong since the look in her eyes now made him want to stab into her sockets and then kill her.

"Darkness…you're going to learn what true darkness is," Yato said as he sent a surge of his abnormal colored chakra to his palm.

"Your eyes will now lose their warmth, just like mine did..." he sighed, looking down at the girl who was now lying on her back.

Sakura fell unconscious, her limp body smacked against the dirt floor. Yato then placed the mask back on his face and pulled the maroon colored hood over his head and teleported away.

* * *

"Sasuke, we, uh, need to get home...they'll be wondering where we are," Kiba said silently.

"You can go if you want but I'm staying," Sasuke replied evenly.

Sakura had been missing for hours. Nobody's tracking abilities had returned yet and it was getting darker and darker.

Shino, Hinata and Naruto regrouped with Sasuke, Kiba and Sai.

"Sasuke, my bugs are picking up a scent. It might be Sakura's," Shino announced.

Sasuke turned towards the newcomers and aggressively paced to them and yelled: "Where!?"

"Follow me," Shino said and began running through the woods.

Everyone followed closely behind him. The bugs seemed to be going in a single direction, but began to swerve back and forth.

"Damnit Shino what the fuck is wrong with these bugs?!" Uchiha criticized. Most people in this group had never seen Sasuke this openly angry.

Kiba spoke up, "Wait, wait I think Akamaru is smelling something."

The large ninja dog sprinted to the side and everyone followed. Akamaru then stopped suddenly and then whimpered.

"Damnit, those bastards are playing with us," Kiba seethed. "His nose clouded up again. We're at a dead end."

Sasuke clenched his teeth. He was beyond frustrated, stressed and every other terrible feeling he could feel. If felt as if there were heavy weighed objects in his body weighing him down. This feeling of helplessness ran through his veins making him feel weak. He didn't like this feeling. He'd rather take a wound from an enemy than to feel this feeling of hopelessness that he could do nothing to find the one he would protect.

"We can still find Sakura," Sai said braking Sasuke out the negative spell his thoughts had him under.

Sai pulled out a red colored Konoha headband.

"Sakura's headband!" Naruto commented.

"I'm going to use my summoning to track her scent. As of now we can't rely on Shino and the other two for their tracking abilities."

Sai handed the headband to Sasuke. Sasuke looked down at it and clenched it tightly in his hand.

Sai reached into his bag and pulled out his scroll and he quickly stroked a brush on the paper and summoned wolves. Sasuke extended the headband to the ink summoning. The wolf sniffed and began to run north scent he had caught the scent. They all took off after the summoning, running beyond what their strength was allowing them to.

A clearing was made through the forest and a cave opening was spotted the summoning ran in and a few steps behind, so did the Konoha nin. A source of light was seen around the corner Sasuke pushed his body to pick up a bit more speed. He turned the corner and abruptly stopped. There he saw her, laying on the dirt floor unconscious and bound by her hands and feet.

"_Sakura!_" Sasuke gasped.

His stern face didn't seemed relieved. This was the breaking point. He ran to her and kneed right by her. He put her head in his lap he lowered his head to see if she was still breathing. He then heard her soft breath and his facial expression softened as some panic left him. He then reached into his pocket and pulled out a kunai and cut the rope that had her bound.

Sasuke rolled her onto her back and placed her head in his hands. He dipped his head down to have his face mere centimeters away from her.

"Sakura, Sakura...wake up, please," he whispered to her.

_I can't lose you… _

Hinata crouched next to them and brought green chakra to her hands and waved them over Sakura's body.

"Her body seems to be unharmed, but her brain waves seem to be low on activity," Hinata reported.

Sasuke wrapped one arm around her neck and the other under her legs and picked her up.

"Hospital," was all Sasuke managed to say. His mind was racing a mile a minute, but he was relieved nonetheless.

* * *

It was the middle of the night when the team got back to the village. Sasuke hardly took his eyes off of Sakura the entire trip home. Sai, Kiba and Shino left to the hokage's office to report what happened and Sasuke, Sakura, Naruto and Hinata went to the hospital.

They burst into the hospital and the receptionist called for a wheelchair for her. Sasuke was reluctant at first to give her up but he did, and she was taken away.

Sasuke sat in the waiting room and slumped down, letting his exhaustion show now that Sakura was safe.

"You can go home, I'll wait for her," Sasuke suggested, knowing how tired Naruto and Hinata were.

"No way," Naruto said and took a seat next to his best friend.

"We won't leave you," Hinata agreed and sat down next to Naruto.

Sasuke felt glad to have friends again after so long.

* * *

The better part of an hour passed before they got any news. A nurse told them Sakura was stable and they were still running tests, but they were welcome to wait in her room in the meantime.

The three of them crowded into her room; Sasuke took the seat nearest to her bed.

"She'll be fine, I just know it," Naruto assured.

"Hn."

"I mean it, we've all gone through worse."

"Yes, but this was...strange. Why did they take her and just leave her?"

"Probably to separate us, and then she fought them off."

"I hope so."

Sakura began shuffling in her bed. All three of her visitors stood up and crowded closer behind Sasuke who was sitting in a chair by her bedside. Her nose twitched and she let out a soft moan.

"...Sakura...?" Sasuke spoke softly.

"MMm, S-Sasuke?" she whispered, still too tired to even open her eyes.

"Yeah, it's me...how do you feel?"

"Just tired," Sakura replied. She opened her eyes and blinked a few times. "Where am I...?"

"The hospital."

"What's going on?" she mumbled to herself, confused on why no source of ligh hadd entered and registered in her brain as she tested the lighting of the room by having her eyes slit open just a little. She faced away from Sasuke and the others when she opened her eyes widely.

"Why is it so dark in here?" she asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Turn on a light."

"The lights are on."

She stayed quiet for a while. Moving her eyeballs in her socket trying to see.

_Why is it dark? _That's when Yato's words came in to her mind. "Darkness… you're going to learn what true darkness is," A silent tear welled up. _So this is what he meant….._

Sakura moved her hand around the bed trying to find Sasuke's hand. Sasuke who was worried beyond belief saw her hand and grasped it.

"Sasuke…." she said calmly. "I can't see anything…" She turned to face him.

She looked in the direction from where she heard his voice.

Everyone gasped.

Sasuke sat there silently in shock looking into white eyes instead of green ones.

* * *

**Hey next chapter. Did you like it? We worked a lot on it so I hoped you did. **

**Follow/Fave/Review thank you! –Saiduck**

**P.S. Update on Children of business in the coming days. **


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